COMMUNITY FORUM

green vinyl sinkers

10 years ago a contractor who remodelled our house installed redwood rabbet-bevel siding on the addition (we now realize) using green vinyl sinkers. The original house siding, also redwood rabbet-bevel siding, was attached with galvanized 8d nails.

We are re-staining our siding and discover that many of the green vinyl sinkers have popped out of the wood, the galvanized nails are still fast even though they are 15 years older.

I complained to a carpenter friend, saying that the contractor was wrong to use green vinyl sinkers on the siding, since (I thought)the vinyl coating was intended to make the nail more "slippery". The carpenter friend says that, no, the vinyl is a glue - it melts with the heat of friction generated when the nail is driven into the wood, then solidifies into a cement when the nail cools. Is this correct? My experience says that it doesn't work that way, but I'd like to know what the experts say, anyway.